From 20 minutes a day to 68k (almost) words

Today I finished the first draft of my new novel. It's on the short side, but my first drafts are always short. Next draft will likely be too long, and then we'll do the accordion thing for awhile and then some people will read it and I'll fall apart and then pull myself and then the novel back together. 

Then we'll see.

The point I would like to make today is that I started this novel back in late January (I think) by writing 20 minutes a day. At the time, 20 minutes seemed like an eternity. Like it would never be over. I didn't even make myself put words on the screen, though usually I did--I just had to sit there and think about the novel.

At some point late this summer, I realized I could finish a draft by the holidays if I wrote 500 words a day. That seemed doable, so I did it, and sometimes did 1,000 with two writing sessions per day. 

As many, many people have observed, writing in 2017 was goddamn hard. And I'm as inclined to beat myself up for low productivity as anyone. I'm here to say that even little bits and pieces, created and assembled on a regular basis, can come together quicker than you might think.